Happiness First, Then Everything Else

[damnedifIknow]

If you accept a job, a relationship, or a lifestyle that you merely tolerate — but don’t appreciate — you’re putting other concerns ahead of your own happiness.

Social conditioning may have convinced you that sacrificing your happiness to maintain a certain bank balance, to send timely payments to corporations to which you’re indebted, or to pay for someone else’s needs and expenses is the proper way to live. Perhaps your parents played a role in this conditioning as well, teaching you the importance of being responsible and holding down stable employment.

If you do these things well, then according to this conditioning, you are successful. You’re doing what’s expected of you, and no one could fault you for that.

But sooner or later you’ll come to realize that successfully paying the bills and satisfying other people’s needs, while depriving yourself of a happy life you’re truly passionate about, is no success at all. In fact, it is complete and utter failure.

If you’ve found yourself in this situation, then you’ve terribly misunderstood the game of life."

http://www.stevepavlina.com/blog/2012/08/happiness-first-then-everything-else/

[ArcticFox]

1. I call bs

Very few of us have the opportunity to pursue our passions. The very idea that we should all strive for that is the cause of much unhappiness. The real key is to find some happiness in the cards you're dealt.

[liberal_at_heart]

2. sometimes dreams change and evolve to adapt to the life you didn't expect to have.

I dreamed of being a field biologist. I got married at 18 and had two kids. I have an autistic son and a legally blind husband who need my help. I tried going to college a few times, but my social anxiety and chronic fatigue issues always prevented me from finishing and have prevented me from working. I realize now that I need to appreciate my life for what it is. I have a blast at school. I love learning. I want to go back to school and I plan to, but I have to wonder if I am really meant to work. Maybe I am and I just have to keep trying or maybe I'm not I should just enjoy learning whatever it is I can learn while I am here on Earth and enjoy my family too. I took my son out shopping for his birthday today and while we were out we had the most fantastic conversations. He is so beautiful. On the way home, he fell asleep in the car. And I thought to myself as I have many times since his birth, he is the reason I am here. I am here to be his mom and to help him through life. That makes me happy. I am also here to find things that bring me personal enrichment and joy and that is where my love of learning about science comes in. I have no doubt I will go back to school, and I have no doubt I will be in awe of the things I learn about our world and our universe. This world is hard and it is ugly sometimes. With all the economic inequality and war in the world I am afraid for my children's futures, but when I look at my life and the beautiful people in it and the beautiful things I get to do while I am alive I realize life is good and I am happy.

[bhikkhu]

3. There are many ways to find happiness

Having children, I can say that I sacrifice a good ten years of life and of my own interests and time to providing for them. There was happiness in that!

As they grew up, I was able to spend more time in my own pursuits, but this also coincided with a great amount of material deprivation - tough years through the recession. But, still, happiness is a choice one can make, and most days I found enough company and good things, small as they might have been (gardening, writing, time with the kids, good books from the library, etc,), to maintain a real smile. If you can do that through hard times, the good times are even more appreciated.

As I have told the kids often, happiness is a choice. Rich or poor isn't so much the determining factor, and when I was most poor is when I was most determined to stick to my choice, as a way of showing that I couldn't be beaten.

[Skittles]

5. too simplistic

I'm sure a lot of women who followed their hearts by staying home to raise the kids will regret their crappy retirement